Op-Ed: BBC Exposes Its Mideast Bias?
July 2, 2012 12:08 by Simon PloskerPerhaps Malcolm Balen concluded something similar. BBC journalists appear to have a similar sympathy towards the Palestinians over Israel portraying them as the victims of Israeli brutality and occupation. In the same way that Libyan rebels were the “good guys” so Palestinian misdemeanors are either ignored or excused away.
So Palestinian rockets from Gaza on Israeli civilians are either part of a “cycle of violence” that accords equal moral value to that of Israeli defensive measures or are simply buried in the headlines referring to Israeli air strikes.
Palestinian incitement in the media or school textbooks is not a story for the BBC, while lack of freedoms and habitual human rights abuses within Palestinian territories are underreported.
Perhaps Malcolm Balen may also have concluded that the BBC fails to acknowledge the inherent extremism of Hamas that may spoil the romanticized and false image of Palestinians as freedom fighters.
While Hamas may be referred to as “militants” in BBC reporting, all this does is bestow a status of moderation upon the Palestinian Authority which has also made demands of a zero-sum nature such as the so-called “right of return” for Palestinian refugees that would mean the end of Israel as a Jewish state.
Why is the PA, which also carries out serious human rights abuses and promotes incitement and anti-Semitism in its media, regarded as moderate?
“User-Generated Content”
Edward Mortimer raised concerns about the risks of “user-generated content,” (UCG) referring to the often dramatic but grainy amateur footage taken by mobile phones and uploaded to YouTube, purporting to show events on the ground.
Academic analysis carried out for the BBC Trust review found that 74 percent of BBC broadcast news items examined over 44 days between December 2010 and January 2012, which featured UGC, contained no caveats about whether it was genuine or representative.
The BBC admitted that there were not enough formal warnings and there were no guarantees that all of the activist footage broadcast without caveats had been judged to be authentic.
Perhaps the Balen Report also found that the BBC has an unhealthy reliance on Palestinian “eyewitnesses” whose versions of events cannot be guaranteed as reliable.
And what about the lack of caveats? Does the BBC announce the reporting restrictions from Gaza where there is risk of intimidation and threats from Hamas, both towards foreign media and against Palestinians who deviate from the party line?
Just recently a BBC reporter tweeted on the tragic death of a two-year old Palestinian girl in Gaza as a result of an Israeli air strike. Yet it was only after differing versions came out from Hamas officials, Palestinian medical personnel and Palestinian eyewitnesses that the same BBC reporter managed to get a confession from Hamas that it was their own misfiring rocket that was responsible for the girl’s death.
“Sporadic Coverage”
The Mortimer Report concluded that BBC coverage of the Arab Spring was not as broad as it could have been. With reporters concentrated in single places such as Tahrir Square in Cairo, reporting from other Arab countries such as Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Yemen and Jordan was sporadic.
In a pre-Arab Spring Balen Report, it might have been concluded that the concentration of BBC resources in Israel also led to sporadic coverage of other Middle East countries (apart from Iraq), leading to a skewed image of the region.
In this Israel-centric BBC universe, the average BBC consumer is falsely led to believe that Israel is the cause of all instability in the Middle East and the only conflict occurring in the region. While Arab populations suffer behind the cloak of brutal regimes, all incidents in Israel become international news broadcast by the BBC.
We may never know what conclusions Malcolm Balen reached back in 2004. But if the BBC was prepared to publicly release the Mortimer Report, and if that report has found fault with BBC Middle East coverage, then you can bet thatBalen found something far worse and more insidious going on.
Op-Ed: BBC Exposes Its Mideast Bias? | Blogs about Israel aggregation
12:19 pm
Jul 02, 2012
[...] article can be viewed at Op-Ed: BBC Exposes Its Mideast Bias? on [...]
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Jeb Stuart
3:45 pm
Jul 02, 2012
BBC coverage and its extreme ineptitude to foreshadow events, and then cover them was mirrored by many American news organizations as well. One I think MSNBC dnews directors great story, was ow he hid cameras from the police in the hotel overlooking Tahir square. Egypt is not the sort of country a reporter is advised to go wandering in and today with more Sariah Laws being imposed a foreigner can run itno some serious trouble just as the Coptics are finding out. The media has become through intimidation and self-imposed-limitations the useful idiots of jihad. Good hotels, with bars, and drinking water are magnets for most reporters in hostile Islamic regions.
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blue_&_white_avenger
4:29 pm
Jul 04, 2012
The copts have run into serious trouble, as you put it, by simply being who they are. In a way, they suffer like the Jews have done over the centuries by being different. Their story is different from the Christians of Iraq (mostly have fled the country over the last 5 years) or of Lebanon.
Basically, they have nowhere to go & no-one prepared to accept them.
Not a very happy situation.
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Lynette
4:20 pm
Jul 02, 2012
it is important for people (and especially those who have a British TV license to whom they are obligated by their Charter to answer ) to continue to challenge the BBC over their biased reporting and appeal against their explanations if they are wrong. .They will need to employ more people to respond to complaints and will be more likely to think twice about putting out misleading information. that will generate complaints.
In 2005 one of my complaints met with the response “not enough people would be offended by this” Don’t give the BBC the opportunity to use this excuse for slandering the Jewish people again!
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Marion Zeiger
4:22 pm
Jul 02, 2012
BBC constantly confirms my definition of their call-letters: Biased Broadcasting Corporation. Their reporters consistently take a single view–e.g., Good Guys, Palestinians; Bad Guys, Israelis; Good Guys, Lybian Rebels; Bad Guys, Government. What passes for in-depth reporting ignores the nuances of the situation on which they’re writing, and their biases violates the underlying vow of responsible reporters–seek out and disseminate truth, without bias or the taint of personal opinion. Until BBC inculcates this philosophy into every member of their staff, they will continue to lack validity, their stories, both written and broadcast, will be just that–stories, not news reporting.
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blue_&_white_avenger
4:39 pm
Jul 04, 2012
Yes: the Beeb has a narrative to which all reporting must conform. I don’t know who wrote the Israel-Arab one but he was no lover of the Jews.
For antisemites, Israel represents a gift from Heaven as they have free reign to criticise it, castigate it & in effect demand its destruction whereas it’s definitely infra-dig to voice the same well-known antisemitic tropes against Jews themselves.
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steven L
6:04 pm
Jul 02, 2012
Who finances BBC intellectually?
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Harvey Rogers
6:06 pm
Jul 02, 2012
The BBC has displayed a hatred of Jews and Israel akin to that of “Der Sturmer,” in Nazi Germany. Someone in its leadership is devoted not to covering news of the Muslim desire and activity devoted to their expressed desire to destroy Israel and kill all Jewish people. When looked at realistically there can be no other explanation for BBC’s course of conduct. I would hope that there is some way to root out the person or persons responsible for that conduct. The editor of “Der Sturmer,” waseventually hanged as a war criminal. There is no need to hang the person or persons responsible for BBC’s conduct in its attempt to aid the Muslim cause in their attempt to destroy Israel and kill Jews.
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Nathan Zafran
3:32 pm
Jul 03, 2012
It seems such a waste of time criticizing the BBC, over it’s twisted and distorted reporting against Israel, and its’ acceptance of Arab evidence for granted. A) the Beeb is immune to the complaints about anti-Israeli bias and B) The Arabs don’t care if their constant lies are exposed. No one dares to complain against them, thus the same obvious lies can be repeated over and over again no one cares, especially the BBC. For example, has any media, (BBC included), truthfully mentioned that the so-called “Arab Spring” is turning out to be a Muslim hurricane and that dictatorships could possibly be replaced by worse dictatorships – (see Iran)? It’s easier and less risky to bash Israel.
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Op-Ed: BBC Exposes Its Mideast Bias? | Jokes of The Conservative Papers
2:56 am
Jul 04, 2012
[...] Read the rest of this op-ed on Page 2 VN:F [1.9.18_1163]Calculating…Rating: 0.0/10 (0 votes cast)topsyWidgetPreload({ "url": "http%3A%2F%2Fjokes.conservativepapers.com%2F2012%2F07%2F03%2Fop-ed-bbc-exposes-its-mideast-bias%2F", "style": "big", "title": "Op-Ed: BBC Exposes Its Mideast Bias? #BBC #Egypt #Freedom #HonestReporting #Islam #Israel #Jihad #Libya #Palestinians #Terrorism" }); No related posts. Filed under Israel, Terrorism Tags: BBC, Egypt, Freedom, HonestReporting, Islam, Israel, Jihad, Libya, Palestinians, Terrorism A Good Question » » [...]
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Jack Kessler
5:43 pm
Jul 05, 2012
It is worse than the writers above claim. If it were mere bias, BBC management could be persuaded by repeated exposure and embarrassment to mitigate or even drop their anti-Israel propaganda line. But one is reminded of Jimmy Carter and the Carter Center, which receives 89% of its funding from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. That is how Carter went from Camp David in 1977 to calling the anti-suicide bomber barrier “apartheid”. NOTHING will persuade Jimmy Carter to change his tune so long as the king pays the piper.
It is hard not to believe that BBC’s budget is not funded in some part by Arab petro-dollars. It converts those inclined to anti-Semitism into those committed to it.
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Ed Frias
3:55 pm
Jul 06, 2012
Jack Kessler to show you what an Israel hater Jimmy Carter is.
Carter quoted a fake Mandela quote about Israel being aparthied, when the quote was by a Palestinian Pallywood liar who pretended to be Mandela. Yet Carter still used the fake Mandela quote.
Go to this link.
http://elderofziyon.blogspot.com/2007/03/jimmy-carter-quotes-fake-mandela-latter.html
March 09, 2007
Jimmy Carter quotes fake Mandela latter to prove Israeli “apartheid”
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Ed Frias
3:57 pm
Jul 06, 2012
Syria runs 27 torture sites.
http://news.yahoo.com/syria-running-27-torture-centers-rights-group-050836605.html
July 3, 2012
And just think Carter thinks Assad is some moderate.
No wonder Carter thought Yasser Terrorfat was a peacemaker.
http://www.campus-watch.org/article/id/12048
Assad’s Emails Hacked: Jimmy Carter Embraced Syria Regime before Obama.
Gianluca Mezzofiore
February 9, 2012
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BBC-Schwachsinn also doch nicht ganz so monolithisch « Medien BackSpin
4:26 pm
Jul 13, 2012
[...] ihre hausinterne Sprachregelung, was Terror betrifft, ihre Blindheit gegenüber Terror, ihre absolut verantwortungslose Haltung, was ihre Berichterstattung über Terror betrifft, dazu die Tränen, die sie für den [...]
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david bernstein
5:31 pm
Aug 26, 2012
the brits have’nt changed …same entrenched , feeling harried by jews, poor defenders of the empire rule in palestine and the world…..can’t accept their diminished role in world politics…….colonial charges have thrown the brits aside, except for their adoption of the policies bringing financial aid,political power to these newly emergent states-the heirs to english colonialism……..they view the tumoil and bloodshed in the mid-east as a normal progression and evolution…..the jews of england who started the the entire process of a ‘jewish’ state in palestine, have been silenced by the ‘lord brits’…….but england is on the wrong end of history !
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